Original Vamp Claire Holt in The Vampire
Diaries - Ordinary People


In 'Ordinary People' we’re heading back in time, to when the Originals were just Ordinary People. Elena, Damon and Alaric will be getting up close and personal with a cave wall in this episode.

“There’s going to be a lot revealed about the Original family and where we came from,” previews Claire Holt, who plays the newest Original vamp in Mystic Falls, Rebekah. For those keeping track at home, the clan also includes blonde, bad boy brother Klaus (Joseph Morgan) and dearly missed Elijah (Daniel Gillies). We’ll also meet the Original mother, the powerful Esther (Alice Evans).

“You get to see how [Rebekah] interacts with her family and what it was like back then,” continues Holt, who says the episode sheds light on “how her relationship with her brothers and how her relationship with Klaus developed. [You'll see] why they became so close and why they are so loyal to each other.”

Perhaps it has something to do with Mikael, the big bad vampire that sends daggers of terror through even Klaus. “You’ll learn that there’s a very good reason why they’re afraid of him,” teases Holt. “It has a lot to do with their history and why they are the way they are… He’s definitely a threat to them.”


Since her introduction in The End of the Affair Claire Holt has been the perfect Rebekah, but this is clearly her episode to show us who Rebekah is. And she is stunning as she creates a sympathetic portrait that exposes her humanity, her weakness, and her ferocious strength. Though we see her crumpled and sobbing, desperate not to be alone for an eternity, Rebekah has not lost any bite as a potential adversary — whether she join sides with Elena or stick with Klaus. And that strong performance makes Elena identifying with her completely believable. Elena, queen of empathy, sees similarities between herself and the murderous Original vampire: both are motherless girls with big hearts who love despite the risk, who prize the bonds of family, and who — in their epic stubbornness — don’t give up on a person easily, or at all.

'The Vampire Diaries' Behind the Scenes of 'Ordinary People': Rebekah's Flashback (PHOTOS)






This episode finds Rebekah revealing a few ancient secrets about the Original family. But will the revelations keep Rebekah from getting into an all-out brawl with Elena (Nina Dobrev)? There's some serious 'Mean Girls' stuff going on here, and we're sort of loving it.

“…At Least Once”: Rebekah tells Elena that every Original family member turned their back on Klaus at least once, and that she herself did it several times. Did the two unaccounted for Original siblings betray him by abandoning him in the village? (Rebekah says some of them scattered.) Or were there more personal betrayals later on down the road? What where the circumstances? Did Elijah and Rebekah evade the coffins for as long as they did because of the pact the three of them made in the village? Or did Klaus present each of them with that choice Rebekah mentioned back in The End of the Affair (EP303)?


“You will learn what I allow you to learn.”
(Rebekah to Elena, Ordinary People)

What We Learned from Ordinary People:

- Mikael is the Original father. Well done, fandom! A lot of you called that.
- Ayana was a witch that the family knew. She was the one who told them to cross the sea to (then unknown) America after a child died of sickness in Europe.
- As humans, the Originals knew about werewolves. They lived in proximity to them without difficulties for many years, until…
- …Werewolves killed an Original child. Klaus took his young brother Henrik to watch the werewolves change on the full moon, and the wolves killed the boy.
- Vampires exist because Mikael wanted to be stronger than werewolves. The death of Henrik caused Mikael to demand a spell that would make the Originals powerful enough to defend themselves against the werewolves.
- The witch Ayana refused to create the spell. She felt it was against nature.
- Esther was also a witch, so she created the spell. Esther turned the children and Mikael into vampires, but could not be both vampire and witch, so she did not turn herself.
- Mikael turned his children into vampires. It was Mikael who executed the specific steps of the spell. After blood was slipped into their wine, he drove a sword through each of them. He did it brutally and without warning them first. Once they awakened, he forced them to drink human blood to complete their transition, per the spell.

- In addition to the Sun, the White Oak tree was part of the spell that created vampires. It gave them immortality. That is why its wood (or the ash of it bound with magic) can kill Originals.
- Vervain hurts vampires because it was growing at the base of the White Oak tree that was used in the spell. Part of the whole balance and consequences thing.
- Sunlight burns Originals. For anyone who needed incontrovertible proof, here it is. They were trapped inside for weeks before Esther figured out a workaround, and we see Rebekah wearing a ring.
- Originals must be invited into homes. Their neighbors were able to keep them out by refusing invitations.
- Klaus’s werewolf side became active after he was a vampire. It triggered when he made his first kill.
- Esther created the spell that cursed Klaus and made his werewolf side dormant. After doing this, she turned her back on him.
- There are two Original children that we haven’t yet seen. (“My mother bore 7 children” says Elijah, in Klaus.) We’ve got Elijah, Klaus, Rebekah, Henrik, one child killed by sickness in Europe. That leaves two Original siblings that are presumably in Klaus’s coffins.
- Rebekah and Klaus carved their names into the wall, but they did NOT write the whole story there. Rebekah had not seen the other images.
- Klaus told Rebekah that Mikael killed their mother by snatching out her heart. This solidified the bond between the two siblings.
- The wall suggests that Klaus killed their mother and then lied about it. We’re not sure which is less trustworthy, a cave wall, or Klaus. Hmm…
- Klaus, Elijah and Rebekah made a pact to protect each other “always and forever.” The other two siblings wandered off somewhere, and seem not to have been as close as those three.